Advertising on Facebook and Twitter will Revolutionize How Businesses Connect with their Customers
by Shannon Folderauer
Spring 2010
Table of Contents
Executive Summary 1
Introduction: Social Media is here to Stay 2
Social Media Success 2
The Power of Facebook: Networking Your Small Business 3
Wawa: An Investigative Case Study 4
Social Media Etiquette: The Do's and Don'ts 5
Reaching Gen Y 6
Recommendations 7
Attachment 1: Social Media Revolution 2 8
Attachment 2: A Sample Facebook Page 9
References 10
Small Business and Social Media 1
Executive Summary
Advertising has changed drastically over the past few years. The world has seen a significant shift away from print media, radio, and television advertisements to targeted advertisements on search engines, video streaming websites, and social media websites alike. Owners of small businesses have been turning to the latter, which offers a domain of free advertising. Using sites like Facebook and Twitter allows for free publicity when an advertising budget may hinder the ability for a small business to establish a presence. There is a right and a wrong way to make a name on these social media sites. Small businesses should take full advantage of advertising on social media and know the right way to maintain a presence on these sites.
Small Business and Social Media 2 Introduction: Social Media is here to stay
Social media can be a great resource to any business when used effectively. They boast the abilities to advertise, network, and stay in touch with current and future clients. Many think that websites like Facebook and Twitter are just passing trends, but the reality is that social networking isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Facebook has more than 400 million active users- 50% of those users access Facebook everyday (Facebook.com)
96% of Gen Y or “Millenials” have joined a social network
Facebook added over 200 million users in less than one year- the television took thirteen years to reach 50 million users.
If Facebook was a country, it would be the third most populated in the world. (Qualman, Erik)
Social Media Success
Businesses with social media exposure net benefits…
Figure 1. Social Media Success Metrics what a social media presence can do for your small-business Source: Business.com 2009 Social Media Benchmarking Study
Small Business and Social Media 3 The Power of Facebook: Networking Your Small Business
Social Media has the ability to attract thousands, even millions of people, just ask Mark Zuckerberg. It doesn’t stop there. Businesses are utilizing the many tools that Facebook offers to reach out to customers, create awareness for new customers, and promote themselves through fan pages, groups, and targeted ads.
Fan Pages
Fan pages are relatively new to Facebook and they give business owners the ability to give their business a profile. The profile mirrors a personal profile, but instead of people “friending” a business they can choose to “like it.” Once a person likes a particular business, the business has a view of the limited profile of this fan. For the business, it has access to a marketing wealth of consumer demographics not only through limited profiles, but by Facebook's tool of offering visitor statistics. (Addicotweb) Businesses utilizing fan pages can directly market to their customers. They can use their status updates to run promotions and announce events. Most businesses take advantage of offering discounts and secret deals through their fan pages. Both businesses and individuals reap rewards from the utilization of fan pages.
A page also gives the business owner applications to spruce up their profile. A restaurant may take advantage of an application entitled Reservationsthat takes reservations for that business. With a fan page, the business owner has the opportunity to directly communicate with its customer. Like a personal profile, on a fan page the owner can choose to update his status which then can appear on any of its fans’ news feeds. Fans can write on the business’s wall to bring praise or voice a negative opinion. (Facebook)
Groups
Facebook groups are another tool that can be utilized by a small business. Creating a group is similar to creating a fan page; however it has some slight differences. A group does not give the owner an option to view visitor statistics, nor does it give the option to update a status. They do allow for individuals to communicate on the group’s wall while the owner maintains a position of administrator. Groups are also less visible and better used to maintain a short term relationship with clients. (Search Engine Journal)
Targeted Ads
Targeted ads are nothing new to the World Wide Web. Google first started using these ads over a year ago. The ads are based on a user’s search terms and preferences. Google then uses related advertisements that may appeal to the user based on these terms and preferences. (Schonfeld, Erick) Facebook is taking advantage of this phenomenon by offering targeting advertising through its banner ads. A business can opt in to using advertisements and filter their placement through demographic and psychographic filters and choose to target their audience based on: age, sex, location, relationship status/interest, and keywords on profiles among other options. Unlike groups and pages, Facebook charges for utilizing its advertising feature. Businesses that begin an advertising campaign on Facebook pay at least $1.00 for each day that the ad is run and if it would rather pay by views or clicks. (Facebook)
Small Business and Social Media 4
Wawa: An Investigative Case Study
Wawa is a privately owned and operated convenience store and self-service gasoline chain that boasts over 800 stores throughout the mid-Atlantic. Most stores are open 24 hours daily, serving customers with a "one-stop shopping experience." Wawa offers everything from made to order hoagies, coffee, milkshakes, fresh fruit, and baked goods. (Wawa)
Recently, Wawa jumped on the social networking bandwagon and created a Facebook page of its own. As of May 2010, their page was just shy of 400,000 fans. The page on Facebook is free for Wawa. It gives them free publicity and advertising and a wealth of marketing research at their fingertips. It fully utilizes the status update feature to inform customers of current promotions, community involvement and events, and to advertise its latest products and services. Wawa takes into account customer feedback, but like many businesses on Facebook uses the option to only show Wawa's feed unless one were to manually click Wawa+Others. This is effective because it shows the prospective customer what Wawa is about, without seeing the unnecessary spam that clogs up some of the other business's feeds. (Wawa's Facebook Page)
Like many things, social networking does have its drawbacks for the corporate sector. More specifically, many groups have been created about Wawa and many other businesses that could possibly discredit or damage their reputations. Some of the more popular groups about Wawa are Drunk Wawa Runs and Who's Sober Enough to Drive to Wawa? As of May 2010, the latter had ten thousand members. (Facebook) The groups create publicity for the company whether it is judged in a poor light or not. "The viral activity of the group is spawning amongst their core market of the future" and maybe that's a good thing. (MNET Blog)
Small Business and Social Media 5
Social Media Etiquette: The Do's and Don'ts
The first step in any project is doing your research. When it comes to creating a social media presence, whether it's on Facebook or Twitter, the key to success is one's knowledge and experience of social media. There is a right way and a wrong way to maintain a small business's networking account. Here are some general guidelines that should be followed to maintain a professional presence the right way:
1. Do Have Personality. Having a personality on Facebook or Twitter does not mean you have to sacrifice professionalism. A dull status or tweet may be playing it safe, but it may also be too robotic. Don't be afraid to spice it up and stick with what gets the best feedback. Don't get carried away- remember that what you post is in public domain.
2. Don't Constantly Update Your Feed or Tweet. Chances are your 'fans' are not fans of spam, and a constant update on their feed from your business probably will not drive brand loyalty so much as brand annoyance.
3. Do Utilize Picture, Link, and Video Sharing. Connect with your customers by showing them your business. It's free publicity- use it! (Frommer, Dan)
4. Do Evolve. Social Media is new and ever-changing. Learn to adapt to the demands of social media.
5. Don't Leave Your Page Under the Guidance of One Person. No two people are alike, so no one person should be in charge of your page to convey your business. Use a team to collaborate the image of your business.
(Woods, Dan) Small Business and Social Media 6 Reaching Gen Y
According to MillenialMarketing.com, most banner advertisements on Facebook are likely to be ignored by Gen Y users. Most of the time the ad is not acknowledged because the user simply does not see it, and when the user does see it, he ignores it because it is annoying. This seems to be the resounding opinion for most Gen Y users, so how can a business effectively reach out and market to Gen Y consumers?
Fanning individual pages of businesses and products on Facebook is one option. In fact, by fanning these pages, users share these pages through a live feed. The live feed almost acts as a peer-to-peer advertising mechanism that projects word of mouth through updates instantaneously to each one of the user's friends. The advertising created by Facebook's live feed gives companies an added bonus to having a page by introducing new customers and reaching present customers. Word of mouth has been proven as one of the most dynamic means of persuading people about products and services for as long as they have been bought and traded. (MillenialMarketing)
From Proximity's focus group sessions conducted on Social Networking, a majority of Gen Y Facebook users said they access Facebook by a mobile device. (Proximity) It's estimated that out of Facebook's 400 million members, 100 million use Facebook mobile. However, it has not been announced if Facebook will implement mobile advertising. (Fbadz) Mobile advertising could prove to be effective if it is contextually relevant to the user. For example, Facebook mobile advertising could place ads based on a user's relative GPS location for restaurants. GPS based advertising on-the-go has the potential to greatly influence Gen Y users.
Figure 2. Facebook Mobile 100 million members access Facebook via Facebook mobile
Source: Facebook Mobile Advertising Plans
Small Business and Social Media 7
Recommendations
It is important for Proximity clients to know that there is a right way and a wrong way to create a social media presence on social networking sites. There are also many ways in which a business can choose to advertise using social media .
Using a Facebook Group
Using Facebook Targeted Ads
Using a Facebook Page
Using Twitter
Each of these choices may benefit a business in different ways, so it's important to keep in mind what social media tool would work best for one's business. However, the Facebook Page receives the most positive feedback from our small business clients who do not have a large advertising budget and want fast results. A Facebook Page gives your business:
Free Publicity. As of May 2010, there is no cost of owning and operating a Facebook page (only if you wish to further advertising using banner ads)
Status Updates. With status updates, a business can easily inform clients of promotions and ongoing events.
Free Marketing Research. Access a fan's limited profile and demographics.
Direct Interaction with Customer. Receive feedback from customers.
The Facebook Page, if used effectively, has the power to revolutionize any small business.
Small Business and Social Media 8 Attachment 1: Social Media Revolution 2 A must-watch video recapping the 'Social Media Revolution...'
proximitya next generation connection
Proximity Research Report
The Synthesis of Small Business and Social Media
Advertising on Facebook and Twitter will Revolutionize How Businesses Connect with their Customers
by Shannon Folderauer
Spring 2010
Table of Contents
Executive Summary 1
Introduction: Social Media is here to Stay 2
Social Media Success 2
The Power of Facebook: Networking Your Small Business 3
Wawa: An Investigative Case Study 4
Social Media Etiquette: The Do's and Don'ts 5
Reaching Gen Y 6
Recommendations 7
Attachment 1: Social Media Revolution 2 8
Attachment 2: A Sample Facebook Page 9
References 10
Small Business and Social Media 1
Executive Summary
Advertising has changed drastically over the past few years. The world has seen a significant shift away from print media, radio, and television advertisements to targeted advertisements on search engines, video streaming websites, and social media websites alike. Owners of small businesses have been turning to the latter, which offers a domain of free advertising. Using sites like Facebook and Twitter allows for free publicity when an advertising budget may hinder the ability for a small business to establish a presence. There is a right and a wrong way to make a name on these social media sites. Small businesses should take full advantage of advertising on social media and know the right way to maintain a presence on these sites.
Small Business and Social Media 2
Introduction: Social Media is here to stay
Social media can be a great resource to any business when used effectively. They boast the abilities to advertise, network, and stay in touch with current and future clients. Many think that websites like Facebook and Twitter are just passing trends, but the reality is that social networking isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Social Media Success
Businesses with social media exposure net benefits…
Figure 1. Social Media Success Metrics what a social media presence can do for your small-business
Source: Business.com 2009 Social Media Benchmarking Study
Small Business and Social Media 3
The Power of Facebook: Networking Your Small Business
Social Media has the ability to attract thousands, even millions of people, just ask Mark Zuckerberg. It doesn’t stop there. Businesses are utilizing the many tools that Facebook offers to reach out to customers, create awareness for new customers, and promote themselves through fan pages, groups, and targeted ads.
Fan Pages
Fan pages are relatively new to Facebook and they give business owners the ability to give their business a profile. The profile mirrors a personal profile, but instead of people “friending” a business they can choose to “like it.” Once a person likes a particular business, the business has a view of the limited profile of this fan. For the business, it has access to a marketing wealth of consumer demographics not only through limited profiles, but by Facebook's tool of offering visitor statistics. (Addicotweb) Businesses utilizing fan pages can directly market to their customers. They can use their status updates to run promotions and announce events. Most businesses take advantage of offering discounts and secret deals through their fan pages. Both businesses and individuals reap rewards from the utilization of fan pages.
A page also gives the business owner applications to spruce up their profile. A restaurant may take advantage of an application entitled Reservations that takes reservations for that business. With a fan page, the business owner has the opportunity to directly communicate with its customer. Like a personal profile, on a fan page the owner can choose to update his status which then can appear on any of its fans’ news feeds. Fans can write on the business’s wall to bring praise or voice a negative opinion. (Facebook)
Groups
Facebook groups are another tool that can be utilized by a small business. Creating a group is similar to creating a fan page; however it has some slight differences. A group does not give the owner an option to view visitor statistics, nor does it give the option to update a status. They do allow for individuals to communicate on the group’s wall while the owner maintains a position of administrator. Groups are also less visible and better used to maintain a short term relationship with clients. (Search Engine Journal)
Targeted Ads
Targeted ads are nothing new to the World Wide Web. Google first started using these ads over a year ago. The ads are based on a user’s search terms and preferences. Google then uses related advertisements that may appeal to the user based on these terms and preferences. (Schonfeld, Erick) Facebook is taking advantage of this phenomenon by offering targeting advertising through its banner ads. A business can opt in to using advertisements and filter their placement through demographic and psychographic filters and choose to target their audience based on: age, sex, location, relationship status/interest, and keywords on profiles among other options. Unlike groups and pages, Facebook charges for utilizing its advertising feature. Businesses that begin an advertising campaign on Facebook pay at least $1.00 for each day that the ad is run and if it would rather pay by views or clicks. (Facebook)
Small Business and Social Media 4
Wawa: An Investigative Case Study
Wawa is a privately owned and operated convenience store and self-service gasoline chain that boasts over 800 stores throughout the mid-Atlantic. Most stores are open 24 hours daily, serving customers with a "one-stop shopping experience." Wawa offers everything from made to order hoagies, coffee, milkshakes, fresh fruit, and baked goods. (Wawa)
Recently, Wawa jumped on the social networking bandwagon and created a Facebook page of its own. As of May 2010, their page was just shy of 400,000 fans. The page on Facebook is free for Wawa. It gives them free publicity and advertising and a wealth of marketing research at their fingertips. It fully utilizes the status update feature to inform customers of current promotions, community involvement and events, and to advertise its latest products and services. Wawa takes into account customer feedback, but like many businesses on Facebook uses the option to only show Wawa's feed unless one were to manually click Wawa+Others. This is effective because it shows the prospective customer what Wawa is about, without seeing the unnecessary spam that clogs up some of the other business's feeds. (Wawa's Facebook Page)
Like many things, social networking does have its drawbacks for the corporate sector. More specifically, many groups have been created about Wawa and many other businesses that could possibly discredit or damage their reputations. Some of the more popular groups about Wawa are Drunk Wawa Runs and Who's Sober Enough to Drive to Wawa? As of May 2010, the latter had ten thousand members. (Facebook) The groups create publicity for the company whether it is judged in a poor light or not. "The viral activity of the group is spawning amongst their core market of the future" and maybe that's a good thing. (MNET Blog)
Small Business and Social Media 5
Social Media Etiquette: The Do's and Don'ts
The first step in any project is doing your research. When it comes to creating a social media presence, whether it's on Facebook or Twitter, the key to success is one's knowledge and experience of social media. There is a right way and a wrong way to maintain a small business's networking account. Here are some general guidelines that should be followed to maintain a professional presence the right way:
1. Do Have Personality. Having a personality on Facebook or Twitter does not mean you have to sacrifice professionalism. A dull status or tweet may be playing it safe, but it may also be too robotic. Don't be afraid to spice it up and stick with what gets the best feedback. Don't get carried away- remember that what you post is in public domain.
2. Don't Constantly Update Your Feed or Tweet. Chances are your 'fans' are not fans of spam, and a constant update on their feed from your business probably will not drive brand loyalty so much as brand annoyance.
3. Do Utilize Picture, Link, and Video Sharing. Connect with your customers by showing them your business. It's free publicity- use it! (Frommer, Dan)
4. Do Evolve. Social Media is new and ever-changing. Learn to adapt to the demands of social media.
5. Don't Leave Your Page Under the Guidance of One Person. No two people are alike, so no one person should be in charge of your page to convey your business. Use a team to collaborate the image of your business.
(Woods, Dan)
Small Business and Social Media 6
Reaching Gen Y
According to MillenialMarketing.com, most banner advertisements on Facebook are likely to be ignored by Gen Y users. Most of the time the ad is not acknowledged because the user simply does not see it, and when the user does see it, he ignores it because it is annoying. This seems to be the resounding opinion for most Gen Y users, so how can a business effectively reach out and market to Gen Y consumers?
Fanning individual pages of businesses and products on Facebook is one option. In fact, by fanning these pages, users share these pages through a live feed. The live feed almost acts as a peer-to-peer advertising mechanism that projects word of mouth through updates instantaneously to each one of the user's friends. The advertising created by Facebook's live feed gives companies an added bonus to having a page by introducing new customers and reaching present customers. Word of mouth has been proven as one of the most dynamic means of persuading people about products and services for as long as they have been bought and traded. (MillenialMarketing)
From Proximity's focus group sessions conducted on Social Networking, a majority of Gen Y Facebook users said they access Facebook by a mobile device. (Proximity) It's estimated that out of Facebook's 400 million members, 100 million use Facebook mobile. However, it has not been announced if Facebook will implement mobile advertising. (Fbadz) Mobile advertising could prove to be effective if it is contextually relevant to the user. For example, Facebook mobile advertising could place ads based on a user's relative GPS location for restaurants. GPS based advertising on-the-go has the potential to greatly influence Gen Y users.
Source: Facebook Mobile Advertising Plans
Small Business and Social Media 7
Recommendations
It is important for Proximity clients to know that there is a right way and a wrong way to create a social media presence on social networking sites. There are also many ways in which a business can choose to advertise using social media .
Each of these choices may benefit a business in different ways, so it's important to keep in mind what social media tool would work best for one's business. However, the Facebook Page receives the most positive feedback from our small business clients who do not have a large advertising budget and want fast results. A Facebook Page gives your business:
The Facebook Page, if used effectively, has the power to revolutionize any small business.
Small Business and Social Media 8
Attachment 1: Social Media Revolution 2
A must-watch video recapping the 'Social Media Revolution...'
Source: Youtube (2010)
Small Business and Social Media 9
Attachment 2: A Sample Facebook Page
Here is Wawa's Facebook Page:
Source: Wawa' Fan Page
Small Business and Social Media 10
References
Addicott Web (2009, January 23). Marketing Your Business on Facebook: Group or Page. Retrieved from http://www.addicottweb.com/2009/01/marketing-your-business-on-facebook-group-or-page/ on May 5, 2010.
Business.com (2009). 2009 Social Media Benchmarking Study. Retrieved from http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com/2009/12/28/what-social-media-can-do-for-your-business/ on May 2, 2010.
Facebook. (2010). Statistics. Pages. Retrieved from http://facebook.com/#!/press/info.php?statistics and http://www.facebook.com/advertising/?pages on May 2, 2010.
Fbadz. (2010, March 24) Facebook Mobile Advertising Plans. Retrieved from http://fbadz.com/2010/03/facebook-mobile-advertising-plans/ on May 17, 2010.
Frommer, Dan. (2010, March 29). 6 Do's and Don'ts for Your Company's Twitter Account. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com/6-dos-and-donts-for-your-companys-twitter-account-2010-3 on May 3, 2010.
Millenial Marketing. (2010). Can Facebook Ads Be Effective? Retrieved from http://millennialmarketing.com/2010/04/millennials-advise-marketers-about-facebook-ads/ on May 17, 2010.
MNET Blog. (2010, March 9). Wawa: Case for Compelling Facebook Marketing. Retrieved from http://blog.maintainnet.com/post/84971729/wawa-case-for-compelling-facebook-marketing on May 2, 2010.
Proximity. (2010). Social Networking Focus Group Findings. Retrieved from http://engl317s10.wikispaces.com/MWF+1+social+networking+focus+group on May 17, 2010.
Qualman, Erik. (2010, May 5). Social revolution 2. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/user/Socialnomics0 on May 5, 2010.
Schonfeld, Erick. (2009, March 11). Google Now Let's You Target Ads At Yourself. Retrieved from http://techcrunch.com/2009/03/11/google-now-lets-you-target-ads-at-yourself/ on May 10, 2010.
Search Engine Journal. (2009). Facebook Group vs Facebook Fan Page: What's Better?. Retrieved from http://www.searchenginejournal.com/facebook-group-vs-facebook-fan-page-whats-better/7761/ on May 10, 2010.
Wawa. (2010). About Wawa. Retrieved from http://www.wawa.com/WawaWeb/About.aspx on May 12, 2010.
Wawa. (2010). Wawa. Retrieved from http://www.facebook.com/#!/wawa?ref=ts on May 12, 2010.
Woods, Dan. (2009, October, 13). Social Media Do's and Don'ts. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/2009/10/11/social-media-enterprise-technology-cio-network-yusuf.html on May 15, 2010.
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